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So monastic legacy states the following:
Prerequisite: Still mind class feature, Improved Unarmed Strike.
Benefit: Add half the levels you have in classes other than monk to your monk level to determine your effective monk level for your base unarmed strike damage. This feat does not make levels in classes other than monk count toward any other monk class features.
How does that interact with the ninja ability Unarmed Combat Mastery?
Unarmed Combat Mastery: A ninja who selects this trick deals damage with her unarmed strikes as if she were a monk of her ninja level –4. If the ninja has levels in monk, this ability stacks with monk levels to determine how much damage she can do with her unarmed strikes. A ninja must have the Improved Unarmed Strike feat before taking this trick.
or the Champion of Irori PrC which counts as monk for the purpose of improving unarmed strike damage but isn't specifically the monk class which is what is called out in the Monastic legacy feat description.
prototype00
RAW it is ambiguous. The main issue is the ability to possibly end up with more levels of the ability than you have character levels.
The ninja ability would cause levels of ninja to stack with levels of monk as if they were monk levels (with a -4 modifier). So in that respect they are essentially monk levels so you wouldn't double dip.
I'd check the wording of the PrC to see what it states too.
RAI, obviously not.
If it was my game, I would rule that Monk and Ninja (with the trick) stack, but only Ninja-4.
Those other 4 levels would count as "non-monk levels", and give another +2, so I guess esentially it's Monk+Ninja-2
I'm not sure if that second sentence is 100% RAW, but the first is. Specific trumps general in this case.
I'd allow it. It only becomes better than a straight Monk's unarmed damage at level 14.
Therein lies the issue, it is clearly meant to improve the ability in a minor way in regards to multi classing. It shouldn't ever bypass the straight class' ability.
Huh? Maybe i'm a bit slow today, but how exactly can this feat make you bypass the straight monk?
Monk levels + 1/2 other levels <= character level
Or do you actually want to throw the Ninja-4 ontop of that? So basicly
Monk levels + 1/2 ninja levels + (ninja levels-4)
??
I don't believe the comment was in regards to your suggestion.
As for your comment, the 2nd portion would not be RAW. Levels are either class level or they aren't, you can't say Ninja levels are class levels "except for the 4 that don't count."
I'd allow it. It only becomes better than a straight Monk's unarmed damage at level 14.Therein lies the issue, it is clearly meant to improve the ability in a minor way in regards to multi classing. It shouldn't ever bypass the straight class' ability.The ability is rubbish, and lack of epic rules mean it caps at 20th level
If it was a GOOD ability (Like stacking Eldritch Heritage: Sylvan with Druid), then I might object (I'm normally fully onboard with EH Sylvan, but that I would smack down).
"Good" is a point of view and a matter of perception, and honestly really has no bearing on what happens with rules in a RAW capacity.
In no way am I saying this formula is correct (or that this feat/ability/prc combo is RAW), but I think this would be the formula nonetheless:
[Monk levels + (Ninja levels - 4)] + (Non-monk levels / 2) = Monk level of unarmed strike damage
In this case, levels in ninja and non-monk levels are the same number. At the earliest, you could do this at 13th level (monk 3/ninja 10), so plug in the numbers:
[3 + (10-4)] + (10/2) = 14, or 2d6 damage
This damage is about on par with the monk. By 17th level (monk 3/ninja 14), the damage would max out at 2d10. Ridiculous? Not any more than a monk with monk's robes. This feat/ability combo with monk's robes (the 3 changes to an 8) would still only max out the damage one level earlier than a monk. I don't think that's so bad. And as for the prestige class, I would add those levels with the original monk levels (just like the monk's robes) as well as to the non-monk levels.
So half for the strict RAW reading of the feat and half against?
prototype00
the ninja is a second class, you would add the unarmed damage. if the ninja was level 10 there unarmed strike would be 1d10. if you were a level 13 total character your unarmed strike would be ?
ninja is 1d10
total character level is 1d8
those would equal ?
put it in hero lab and throw in a monks robe to be fun
